


The Faults of a Person are like the Sun and Moon

by hai_se_r



Series: Of Lionhearts and Heroes of Old [1]
Category: Fate/Apocrypha, Fate/Grand Order, Fate/stay night & Related Fandoms
Genre: Angst, Emotional Baggage, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Family Problems, Gen, Grudge, Hurt/Comfort, Mistakes Are Made, PTSD, Parents, Self-Hatred, Teen Angst, Trauma, burdens, karna and fujimaru have a heart to heart, mother - Freeform, mothers, parent, ritsuka hates herself
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-04
Updated: 2020-02-04
Packaged: 2021-02-27 23:01:10
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,602
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22553674
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/hai_se_r/pseuds/hai_se_r
Summary: In which Fujimaru Ritsuka asks Karna if he's ever hated the woman who gave birth to him.She wonders if she does.
Relationships: Fujimaru Ritsuka & Karna | Lancer of Red, Karna | Lancer of Red & Reader
Series: Of Lionhearts and Heroes of Old [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1622734
Kudos: 34





	The Faults of a Person are like the Sun and Moon

**Author's Note:**

> Ritsuka had always known her mother was a flawed woman, confident and stubborn, but she has always loved her. Is she a horrible human being for doubting her love now?
> 
> Who is she to hate someone if all she's ever done was make mistakes?

Ritsuka took a deep breath and let her shoulders droop in relief, her eyes are glassy and her breaths are uneven and shaky from weariness. She's alone, so very alone. It's isolation. She let herself drift away from everyone today. Why? Its simple. She's quite tired, exhausted, both mentally and physically which wore down on the quality of her commands and her thought process, so she decided to clear her thoughts and let it cloud her area. 

She sits at the edge of the porch, her legs swinging limply at the edge and her hair, freed from the usual hairstyle, is blocking her sight from the view of the sunset at the edge of the sky. She heaves a sigh, her chest heavy with feeling she can't describe, guilt? No, perhaps anger? She doesn't know. Oh, she's so tired. All she wants is to drop onto her soft comfy bed and block out the world that surrounds her until it was time to work again. Her eyes flutter to a close. She drops her head, letting herself curl in on herself, knees pressed to her chest and arms wrapped around herself, giving herself the comfort that she barely seeks. She lets herself rest her forehead on her knees, hopeless and a bit solemn. Her thoughts fly easily the moment she lets her guard down.

There is silence.

Its a hanging silence, not the peaceful silence where one could find herself relaxed and liberated from the stress and burdens, not the silence where she could unravel herself and no one would still hear her. It was a silence that accused her and just made her feel like the whole world was against her, just waiting for her to break, to crack. Then, and only then, will it leave her, shattered glass and the feelings of shame in its wake.

The silence is interrupted by the sound of clanging armor and the sound of footsteps approaching her. Curious, she lifts her head slightly and looks towards the direction of the approaching figure. Karna. The white haired lancer with the impressive straight face and words so honest that it gave people the wrong impression. The Hero of Charity. 

Oh, she feels her cheeks heat up in shame. Here she is, all shaky and mournful that she's like a newborn fawn just learning how to walk through life, unsure of everything she does and everything she sees.

She hears him clear his throat.

"Do you mind if I join you, Master?" Karna raises a brow, his hand curled into a gentle fist by his mouth. Ritsuka gives a small smile, not quite reaching her eyes, and hoping to convince Karna that she was fine. Considering the small frown and furrowed eyebrows she gets, she's not entirely successful.

"I-" Her voice is strained and hoarse, she pauses to clear her throat before she starts to talk again, "I don't mind."

Karna sends her a small nod before kneeling down and sitting at her level beside her. Ritsuka waits patiently for Karna to speak up, and when she realizes he's not speaking up anytime soon and only just accompanying her out in the porch, she looks out back to the horizon and watches the sun set and for the moon to rise. The peace between them gives her relief she didn't find during her short time in solutide. Its when the stars twinkle and the moon is just peeking from behind the clouds when Karna speaks up, breaking the quiet with his voice, smooth, quiet and inquiring. 

"If you don't mind my prying, Master, would you mind telling me what has been plaguing your thoughts for a whole day?" He doesn't look at her when he asks, only staring up at the night, his cerulean blue eyes twinkling. She's been waiting for the inevitable questioning but she doesn't know how to convey her dilemma yet without sounding like an emotionless being because she is anything but.

When his question remains unanswered for a few moments, he turns his head, his head tilted towards her, his hands propped up behind him to support his leaning form. She looks away from the sky and meets his gaze before looking back up towards the sky.

"I don't know how to tell it in a way that won't make it sounds so bad." She grudgingly mutters, looking confused and tired at the same time. Karna looks at her for a hard second before looking out again as well, his face remaining impassive, not revealing a single thought going through his mind. "Just tell me as sit comes, I would not judge you. You should know this Master. I understand it. I understand how challenging it is to put your thoughts out there in the best way possible as I have that problem. So please, do you mind sharing your thoughts to this lowly servant?"

Ritsuka looks at him from the corner of her eyes, distaste at the tip of her tongue from his use of calling himself a lowly servant. "You're not a lowly servant you know? You're a confidante."

The corner of his lips twitch up, his eyes shining with a bit of gratitude, "It's an honor to be considered as such."

"I-" Ritsuka starts, her words refraining from escaping her mouth in a harsh struggle. She sighs and Karna waits in patience for her to collect her thoughts.

"Do you hate your mother Karna?" She asks suddenly, getting a surprised glance from him. "Kunti, I mean." She elaborates, clearing her throat in anxiousness and nervousness. Hearing no response from the lancer, she starts to sputter, starting to apologize for her rude questions, "I- Sorry-I didn't-Forget what I ask-"

"I suppose you don't mind me asking what brought this thought up?" He asks, calm and peaceful, his eyes looking at her with fondness only reserved for the people he's grown close to. She pauses abruptly, her cheeks still faintly colored in red from her previous embarrassment, her eyes are wide with disbelief and shock, not registering his question.

"Master?" He asks, his eyebrow raised questioningly at her. She takes a moment to collect herself and then clears her throat and asks what he said.

"What brought the question up Master?" His tone reveals no malice nor anger nor any negativity, just plain curiosity. She pushes the other thoughts to the side and lets her shoulders slump from the weight of everything that has piled up. "I-It's just that... she left you didn't she? How come you never resented her for that? For leaving you all alone in the world, leaving you, her first son, and then raising 5 other sons...?" Her voice starts to fade near the end, feeling shame creep up her neck, scolding her self for her inconsiderate words. 

Karna hums, looking thoughtful before answering her question, "No, I never hated Kunti. Perhaps I was a bit curious of who she was and why she did what she did, but in the end the reasons why she did what she did and who she was did not affect any of the choices I make and the choices I would've made. She's my biological mother, but growing up in life, you start realizing that family is not restricted to blood but is connected by love. Kunti, my mother, has never loved me, most likely never will, she has shown it, she's given me away, she gave away her rights to me, and I had never grown up with her so I couldn't possibly love Kunti like a mother. To answer your question: no, I have never hated my mother." Karna looks towards her, his eyes are calm, and his posture is relaxed, showing no signs of lying or any other sort.

"Oh," she breathes, eyes a bit wide and glassy, but she is tranquil. "You're- you're a good person Karna, so willing to understand, to push away any negative feelings or thoughts towards them."

"You're a good person as well Master." 

"Am I?" She asks, breathlessly, hesitant but unforgiving, "Am I really?"

"Yes," Karna sits up straight, looking directly at her face, a small frown on his face, "Has something occurred that made you doubt the goodness of your heart?"

She laughs, a broken sound, harsh and strained, grating against both of their ears. 

"I think I hate my mother."

"I don't think hating a person is what decides if you are good or not." Karna tells, soft and steady, studying her carefully.

"No, but who am I to hate her? Me, who was let thousands die at the hands of Goetia. ME. I let a mother die at the gates of Camelot, when all we planned was to escape, and I even had the guts to lie to a the son, to tell him that his mother was only just separated and at a different location. I let countless soldiers and servants die for me, to stall, to stop my incompetence from failing the whole plans made. My weaknesses have killed people. ROMANI! I let ROMANI die because I couldn't do anything to Goetia. He died, I'll never see him again because he sacrificed himself when all I ever did was tease and bully him. Who am I to hate the person who has nourished me for 9 months in her belly? Who's endured pain to give birth to me? All I ever did was practically kill everyone around me! My decisions have led countless lives lost because I was naive. Who am I to decide who lives or dies because I was simply one of the people who had enough power to save others? Am I really so different from the humans that Goetia has clearly hated, who he had sought to destroy? I let a whole city fall and die to one of the original beasts of sin, Tiamat, and I let her children kill more of us. I learn that despite clearing the singularity, in the end, they will all die in proper history. I have ruined the lives of people from the past, I have stopped the future generations because I was weak. WEAK! Who am I? I'M A COWARD! A CHILD TRYING TO PLAY ADULT." Tears are falling from her eyes unbashedly, her voice cracking at random moments due to her volume, her hand on top of her chest, clenching her shirt.

"My mother..." she sobs out, her eyes clenched shut, trying to stop the rapid tears, "She is a horrible woman, vile, conceited, loveless. She has no loving bone in her body, she has only left me to fend for myself, she cares for no one but herself. Do you know how many she has killed? Because of her belief that she is at the top of the social hierarchy, she has wrought down the confidence of a mother who has worked so hard to raise her kids singlehandedly, calling her a whore, a hoe, simply because there is no father in sight and no ring on her finger. It's because she appears like a haggard woman, worked so hard she looks like she had fought a whole war. I asked her why? Why? Why did she do that to the woman who's been nothing but kind, loving, genuine and gentle? She s-said, SHE SAID-" Ritsuka's voice sounds hysterical to the both of them, reaching high note, "SHE SAID SHE WAS PATHETIC! She called a hardworking woman pathetic simply because she saw herself. I saw it. The self contempt that she reeked of everytime she saw a woman who only appeared to look a bit like her situation. ITS NOT EVEN A WONDER WHY MY FATHER LEFT! DAMN HER! SHE'S SO HYPOCRITICAL! SO TOXIC! She's a snake, preying on the weak and thriving in the glory of the hunt, the win, and everything that made her better."

Ritsuka pauses, panting from anger, frustration, and everything she's felt towards her mother. "Why?" Ritsuka asks, her voice so drastically quieted to a whisper, shaking and uneven, "Why'd she leave me? Why did she do it? I-I just wanted for her to feel proud? I've only ever been the perfect daughter that she wanted. Why did she leave me? I loved her. No-I love her."

Ritsuka looks straight into Karna's eyes, her eyes bloodshot and watery. "She's my mom," She says, as if she was trying to explain why, "She's my mom, why shouldn't I love her? But she-she's so- my mom, she's my mom, why can't I love her? You're supposed to love your mom, give her your everything. She's supposed to teach me about life, she's supposed to be by me, guiding me. She's not there. Why is she not there? Is it because I wasn't enough?"

Ritsuka chokes on her saliva, her eyes are wide with realization, horror filled in them. "Did she love her step kids more than me?"

"Ohhh," she moans, groaning as if in pain, rocking herself back and forth as she curled in on herself once more, "She was my mom, why didn't she love me?"

"Mom. Mom. Mom. Mom." Ritsuka chants over and over again, like a prayer, as if it would summon her mother and answer her questions.

"Master," Karna starts out gently, "Calm yourself."

With his call remaining unanswered, he grabs her wrists, making her look up from the heels of her palm that pressed on her eyes. "Master" is all he says and the stern tone in his voice made her pause from her hysteria.

"Karna..." she whispers.

Karna leans in and wraps his arms around her, "Master, let it go. Let it all go, gradually, don't let it run rampant."

Ritsuka sniffles, rubbing her eyes with her hand before leaning into his embrace and slumping against him, letting all her weight onto him.

"I hate her you know? I hate her." Ritsuka says so, more to herself than to him, but it was a lie, a poor said lie, and they both knew it.

Karna hums. 

"You have the right to hate her Master. It is human to be flawed. We are imperfect, filled with mistakes, covered in holes and cracks and missing pieces. You are an awe inspiring person. You have made mistakes, some with more drastic consequences, but it is fine. You're allowed to fumble and tumble and to stay down just for a bit longer than the other times but you get up, because that's who you are. A human who's responsibilities are a bit more demanding than others, who's made mistakes, and who's familial relationships filled with cut up connections. Don't call yourself anything but Ritsuka, the master who single handedly fought Goetia and won, who's saved humanity from extinction, you're the human who's done everything she could've and as one of your many heroic spirits, It is safe to say it has been an honor to have fought for you and with you. You are not coward, hypocrite, bad, evil and not even Fujimaru, but you are Ritsuka, and that is all you have to be, that is what you owe yourself, Master." Karna hugs her a bit tigher in the end as he feels her tears fall on his shoulders.

"Thank you... Karna..." she whispers as she hugs him tigher.

"It is no problem Master."

With that, Ritsuka lets everything go as she leans against him in his embrace and lets herself mourn the things she's never let herself. She mourns the loss of her mother, Romani, the victims of both her and her mother, and the loss of Ritsuka, the girl who she never let herself be.


End file.
